TORONTO — Bryan Colangelo has high hopes for his team’s latest first-round draft pick, but he is prohibited from uttering his name — Lithuanian centre Jonas Valanciunas — under the constraints of the NBA lockout.

The president and general manager of the Toronto Raptors is eager to dip his toes into the free-agent pool, and possibly even pursue a few trades, but he is presently waiting in limbo for the league and its players union to forge peace.

Such is the life of Toronto’s 46-year-old arbiter of talent, illuminating his team’s future while NBA fans wait patiently in the dark for play to resume.

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“The pick that we made in the last draft should turn out to be a very valuable pick for this franchise,” Colangelo said of the 6-foot-11 European prospect. “We’re looking at adding potentially another quality, solid player, in what’s known as a very deep draft [next year]. Regardless of where we end up this year, we’re going to get some talent.”

Colangelo was part of a panel at the 2011 Sports Management Conference in Toronto on Tuesday, and offered his insight on such topics as talent acquisition and building a winning product.

“Last year, if we chose the player everyone wanted us to, we wouldn’t have taken a young European player in the draft, who’s likely the best young centre prospect to come to the NBA in years,” Colangelo said. “Instead we made a selection that caused a little bit of angst in the room, and a thousand people [were] booing rather than cheering and getting excited about something.

“But you have to act in the best interest of the organization, both short and long term, at all times.”

Colangelo is not selling a quick panacea for what ails his club after a 22-60 season – the second-worst record in the Eastern Conference.

“It became clear that in order for us to take the biggest step forward, we were going to have to knock some things down [and] rebuild,” he said, “and we’re knee-deep in that process right now. Depending on what we do this year, and how things play out over the next 12 months, we may have as much as US$24-million in [salary] cap flexibility.

“It’s not just targeting free agents, but you can use [cap] space to obtain players without worrying about a traded-player exception.”

There is little else the GM can do besides play the waiting game, after adding new head coach Dwane Casey and executive Ed Stafanski. The players rejected the league’s latest offer for a new collective bargaining agreement Monday, leaving Toronto’s architect to speak hypothetically.

“It’s important to let [Casey] not only implement his system, but ascertain how the players that we have fit that system,” Colangelo said. “Until he actually gets his hand on the players and sees them on a daily basis, we’re going to be looking at a year of evaluation.”

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